A Certain 'Je Ne Sais Quoi'
by Watanabe Maya
Summary: He thinks of what they are and what they could have been. A quick vignette featuring snippets of their lives and a view on the complexity of their relationship. (FrUK Oneshot)


I've been away from the Hetalia fandom for a while, so please forgive me. Here's a little thing I came up with because I wanted to accomplish writing something before christmas break ends. I've didn't always quite understand the FrUK pairing, and I wasn't so hardcore in shipping it compared to USUK or SpaMano before, but I was able to find the true beauty of this ship thanks to a couple of amazing doujins and fanfics (my ultimate fruk favorites: What the heart forgets by lenarix_klinde & a week without rain by totemundtabu & the art of being emotionally detached by save the rave). FrUK is complicated and it can be heartwrenching and sometimes cute but it is mostly beautiful. Sometimes it can leave you feeling a little lost, but that's okay. It's my third-most fav ship for a reason. With all that being said, I wanted to try a fic that showed the messiness of their nature, and to highlight the fact that not all relationships are fairytale romances with happy endings (even though we all wish that they were, and they usually feel like they could be, at times). There are a couple allusions to historical events, I just googled and used wiki to research on the basics. This fic isn't perfect, it's messy and unbeta'd and i wasn't in the perfect state of mind to be writing anything (haha) so i'm sorry if it doesn't suit your standards. Nonetheless, I hope that you still like it, even by a little bit.

Happy reading!

**Disclaimer: **I don't own Hetalia and its characters.

* * *

When France watches him, England is always the first to turn away.

It isn't easy, balancing themselves on this tightrope of emotions, the borderline romance that these countries share. Francis, even as the country of love, admits this; submits himself to the truth that it is indeed a struggle when one falls for their rival nation.

He has watched him since they were young; his gaze forever lingering on this petite boy with the lanky limbs and sandy hair, his heart forever lost in the abyss of the other's dashing, brilliant eyes. From the moment they chanced upon each other in the middle of the woodland forest until the time he became independent, free on his own – France has always been there to see him grow. And every time they meet, he gives away a part of himself to this little boy – his words, his fashion, the culture of his people.

Francis just doesn't know when he started giving him his heart away, too.

-x-

Maybe it began during their first meeting, the summer of his childhood. The forest of their past, lush and vibrant with the abundance of trees, a perfect match to the boy's small cape. His skin was like porcelain, slick with sweat, glistening underneath the sweltering summer heat.

Francis remembers watching. He remembers being intrigued, for even his own amethyst eyes could never compare to the other's captivating emeralds.

"What do you want, frog? Are you here to attack me? To take over my lands?" a voice calls out to him, though Francis can't help but chuckle at the odd nickname he had just received. Tiny hands draw forth a makeshift bow out of olden twigs, thick brows furrowing in concentration, shoulders stiff and heavily on-guard.

"_Non, _do not worry yourself. I will do no such thing," Francis replies, stepping out of the bushes, raising his hands up in mock-surrender. "My name is not 'frog.' I am Gaul, your neighbor nation. You are…?"

"Avalon," the boy replies haughtily, hands resting on his hips before returning to their place on the small bow. "If you have no business here, _Gaul_, I would like to request that you leave."

"Ah! But _mon cher," _the Frenchman exclaims, "that is no way to treat your friends!"

"Who said anything about us being friends, you frog?!" the boy snarls, voice bitter with a tinge of annoyance.

"Well," he says with a warm smile and an outstretched hand. "I did."

The boy takes his hand just as quickly as he lets it go and turns away, his ears hot and warm and a bright, bright red.

"Suit yourself," the boy mutters before he takes his leave, his legs struggling to catch up with his thoughts as Francis watches him run further away, figure speeding off into the distance and soon enough, lost in the maze of birch, thorn apples, and sessile oak.

-x-

He remembers the Hundred Years War. He remembers it clearly.

There was the clashing of swords, the noise of the canyons, the bloodlust and the betrayal and the bodies strewn mercilessly around the battlefield. The sounds still ring in his ears. The sights still haunt him in his nightmares.

But more than anything, he remembers that night in Leulinghem in 1389, against cobblestone floors and limestone walls, the hardness of the stone and the softness of his voice, the coldness of the surface and the warmth of his skin, the quiet of the night and the loudness of his whisper. It's all still there, in the depths of his mind, echoing distantly in the midst of his dreams.

_"Tell me, oh sweet, sweet Britannia," _Francis coos into his ears, husky and low and sickeningly sweet. _"What does it take to make you fall?"_

There is a shudder. A tremble, a short intake of breath; and what he cannot express in the absence of his words, Arthur tells him instead through locked lips and shaky hands and awkward gazes.

_"Who else can it be but you?"_

And it's everything and nothing all at once.

Then their hearts pulse to a rapid crescendo, a hand tangles itself in the other's hair, the heated blush of their cheeks rising and rising to a mad red. They hit the climax, and then suddenly, in an action quick and abrupt, the stillness washes over them.

There is only the silence.

And then they are no more.

-x-

Arthur hates himself for 1431.

He never meant to get her killed. It was the choice of his people, the decision of his leaders, but even as the country of England, it was never his own.

He wishes France would understand.

But he knows that's impossible. To Francis, she was his precious Jeanne, his _petit ange, _the love of his life; and Arthur knows that asking for his sympathy would be downright unreasonable.

Not to mention, stupid.

And then he looks back at 1778, the time France allied with America to fight, and the rage he once had bottled up within is released and let go and he is left feeling sobre and lonesome with only but an emptied bottle remaining in his left hand.

Another deep breath.

He misses Alfred.

But Francis, as he would like to believe, had every right to fight against him.

-x-

In the end, we're all just lonely people yearning to be loved.

-x-

_"Would you like to try again?" _Arthur asks him at the end of the First World War, amidst the stench of gunpowder and the clutter of discarded artillery, his voice practically a whisper against the shouting cheers of victory from their subordinate troops.

And soon enough, it becomes a nightly routine of tender embraces and carnage kisses, in travel lodges and dirt-cheap motels.

But one morning later, when Francis wakes up, it is to a bright, noontime sun and a cold, empty bed.

He finds a note; all crumpled up and tossed aside at the edge of the bed, in scrawled and loopy handwriting that is unmistakably Arthur's.

"_Sorry," _it says, and he feels cheated.

-x-

"Does this mean anything to you?" he asks him the morning after the incident, his tone barely calm and his hand gripping a little too tightly on the rumpled note that his knuckles begin to turn white.

And Arthur, taken aback, looks only at him with wide eyes.

"Does this count as something? I'm tired of always waiting by on the sidelines, of beating round the bush but being unable to do anything about the situation. I am tired, Arthur. _Épuisé_. This uncertainty is eating me up. _Il me détruit. _Tell me, Arthur. After all that we've been through, am I really only _just _a friend to you?"

But England cannot say anything to all this. His chest feels tight, there's a lump on his throat, and on the tip of his tongue there lie the answers of yes, no, and a million more maybe's.

"_Bof! Fais comme tu veux," _France remarks, his voice tainted with the bitter sting of resentment.

"Belt up," England says, finally, at once, too suddenly, maybe. "I…I-I never promised you we would be anything." Then, with a trembling hand he turns the knob and walks out the door and slams it all in the Frenchman's wake.

And Francis only watches, thinks of how the boy's eyes reminded him of leaves after rainfall, sparkling and damp with mildew on its surface.

-x-

And that's the sad truth of it all.

They were never anything.

But sometimes though, in those languid moments between world meetings and quiet afternoons, when he glances at him and offers a shy smile with a little wave of his hand, or in those quiet hours late into the night, when he looks back at their history and their memories and their past and lets his eyes flutter to a close, he likes to think that they could have been.

* * *

**_-x-x-_**

**_Translations:_**

_mon cher – _my dear

_petit ange – _little angel

_Épuisé_. – Exhausted.

_Il me détruit. – _It is destroying me.

_Bof. Fais comme tu veux. – _Fine, do what you want.

**Notes:**

*1389, Truce of Leulinghem - a truce agreed to by Richard II's kingdom of England and its allies, and Charles VI's kingdom of France and its allies, on 18 July 1389, ending the third phase of the Hundred Years' War. [src: wiki]

*1431 – Jeanne d'arc died via execution by burning on May 30, 1431 [src: wiki]

*1778 – the year France recognized the United States of America as a sovereign nation, signed a military alliance, and went to war with Britain [src: wiki]

**Thank you for taking the time to read my story and please do leave a review! :)**


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